Let Nothing Take Me
by Dream Keeper
Summary: One shot. Duo's depressed because he thinks none of his friends care about him. Hilde left because he couldn't return his love and now his life is a mess. He just wants release from the pain...


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Dream Maker: Well folks, standard yada. I do not own Gundam Wing. *sniffs* I wish I did but I don't. The G-boys and girls belong to their respectable owners. I am just using them for this twisted fic. I promise to return them, only slightly worse for the wear when we're through with them. Um. Anything else?  
  
Christa: Warning for suicidal tendencies. Lots and lots of it. And many depressing thoughts.  
  
Dream Keeper: Sorry. We wrote this when we were feeling really depressed. Enjoy.. Or not. take your pick.  
  
Christa: We also don't own the poem. It was written by a person on the net named Vokin. It is his entirely. We're just borrowing it.  
  
"Blah" = speech (no duh!)  
  
(Blah) = thoughts  
  
/blah/ = poem.  
  
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/I sit and stare at Nothing  
  
And it glares and spews back at me  
  
And All I've known  
  
And seemed to meet  
  
In this carousal of tragedy/  
  
(What the hell am I doing here?) he wondered as he stared out into the blackness of the night, looking towards the unforgiving heavens. (Why do I even bother to go on? It's not like anyone cares. No one wants me around. They would have done something by now.)  
  
/In sickness, in health  
  
Things that make me dwell  
  
Somewhere where  
  
I don't know  
  
And never cared  
  
About myself/  
  
(I know I haven't been acting like myself lately. Or have I? Do I just seem the same to them? Is it that when they see me, they don't want to look past the surface and see the real me? Do they just not want to see my blackened soul?) Duo continued to stare out into the night as it began to snow again. It fell softly, silently, reminding him of how he felt inside.  
  
(Cold and silent. It muffles all sound. How fitting for a night like tonight, when I'm just keeping myself company with my memories.)  
  
None of the guys had been to see him in a while. They were all busy getting on wit their lives. They didn't have time for their cocky ex-partner. None of them cared anymore. None of them bothered to write, or to return his calls. It made him feel so cold inside.  
  
(So utterly empty.)  
  
/And souls ripped and teared  
  
In front of me  
  
In the back of my mind  
  
And mind my mind is just  
  
A concrete road  
  
Blood shed upon the Grey/  
  
He sighed and stepped away from the window and walked to the door, opened it to let himself out into the cold winter night. The snow continued to fall around him and he welcomed it. Already the snow was almost up to his knees and as he stood there wearing only pair of pants it began to numb him.  
  
(Thank God, if he truly does exist. I don't think I could stand it right now if I were able to feel. My life is hell. Just let the snow take my feeling away, let it numb me. If I can't feel, I can't hurt.)  
  
He lay down in the snow and let it cover him, bury him under a mound of pristine white. He wanted just to stop caring after all he'd been through. The war was over, so why did he still have to fight? It just didn't make sense.  
  
(But what am I fighting now? Myself?)  
  
/The only memories  
  
The only pain  
  
The only anything that follows burrows and screams  
  
The only thing that fires bullets into my head  
  
The only thing that keeps my sanity fed  
  
The only thing that matters is that my sanity  
  
Long dead  
  
And all is but matterless  
  
Intangible/  
  
Finally he got up and shook of his freezing blanket, opting to go inside and take a hot shower. He cast one last glance over his shoulder and saw a shooting star streak towards the horizon.  
  
(It's as if even the stars have betrayed the skies. Will the pain ever end? Will they ever realize what I'm feeling? Do they even know how they let me suffer? No.) He shook his head and shut the door. Quickly he made his way toward the bathroom and stripped. Then he turned the water on and stepped into the shower. Slowly he took his braid out and let the water just rush over him.  
  
(I remember. I think I told someone how I was feeling. Or did I? I don't remember anymore. I'm just so damned tired of the world. No, I think I did tell Heero, that one day we got together. Yeah, I remember now.) He smiled grimly and let the memory wash over him.  
  
/Like a mornings breath  
  
An unseen sunset  
  
Because I am in Nothing  
  
No screams nor fussing  
  
No pointless fucking  
  
No loving no hating  
  
No solemn debating/  
  
"Hey, Heero. What brings you to this side of the universe?" Duo asked as he opened the door for his friend, forcing himself to smile.  
  
"I just came to check on you. Hilde told me what happened."  
  
Duo frowned and nodded as he shut the door. He led his friend into the living room. "Yeah. I guess she couldn't handle the fact that I'm in love with someone else." He shrugged nonchalantly and took a seat.  
  
"And how you? I know that she did mean a lot to you."  
  
"I'll get over it," he forced himself to say. And it wasn't a lie, it just wasn't the whole truth.  
  
Heero leveled him with a glare. "I don't believe you do. I can see right through your facade. I don't like it when you lie. Its not you're style."  
  
Duo hung his head in defeat. "It wasn't a lie, Heero. I will get over it. She just said those things because she couldn't handle the fact that I thought of her as a sister."  
  
"So how are you really doing?" Heero probed.  
  
"I don't know," Duo admitted finally. "I'm not myself. Some days I don't even know what I'm thinking, and then I catch myself thinking things that I shouldn't. And then sometimes I just feel. Nothing."  
  
/As far as Nothing can reach  
  
And it reaches from corners and depths  
  
Araising between blades of grass  
  
Arising from the bark of widowed willows breast  
  
Downpouring from clouds of stress  
  
Out of the middle of the end  
  
And back before the beginning  
  
And past the end/  
  
"I'm sorry," Heero said, trying to fill up the uncomfortable silence that followed.  
  
Duo raised his eyes to meet his friends'. Silently he begged for Heero to help him, but his pleas fell of deaf ears. Heero didn't understand what he was feeling anymore than Hilde did. It just wasn't fair. "Some days I just want to end it."  
  
"Don't we all?" Heero said wryly, passing his comment off as nothing. Then his face turned serious. "Duo, Hilde didn't say. Who are you in love with?"  
  
Duo stilled on the couch and stared at Heero like a rabbit caught in a snakes gaze. It seemed like someone else speaking when he replied, "You."  
  
/But in me  
  
But in you  
  
But but but why  
  
Because you couldn't bear  
  
You couldn't follow  
  
The disaster and grief  
  
So you kept me in Nothing  
  
And fed me Nothing/  
  
(And you walked out on me, Heero. You didn't even bother to answer me. Why? Do I disgust you that much? Did it make your skin crawl from being in the same room as a gay guy? Or did I just scare you.)  
  
Eventually he turned off the water and got out of the shower, wrapping a towel around himself as he headed for his bedroom. He quickly toweled himself off and put on a pair of sleeper pants. Then he tended to his hair, going through the motions that he'd been doing since he could remember. But somehow it wasn't enough tonight.  
  
He stepped in front of his floor length mirror and smiled at himself, trying to regain his carefree air, if only for a moment. But the person who stared back at him from the looking glass was not him. It was someone else. The face was pale, almost as if the person was dead, the eyes were sunken and had dark rings under them. Even the smile was wrong. It seemed to be more of a feral snarl or a grimace than a look of jubilant happiness.  
  
(I look like a corpse.)  
  
/But always always  
  
My blood of Something  
  
Something fleeting from my wrists  
  
Ejecting to long lost mists  
  
So it starts with one  
  
One moment where  
  
Something happens inside of Nothing  
  
And cannot move  
  
And cannot fly  
  
From my mind  
  
Cannot breath/  
  
Duo moved away from the mirror and back to the bathroom to brush his teeth. He noticed the blade knife sitting on the sink then. He'd brought it in with him yesterday when he'd accidentally cut himself with it. His palm still hurt where the knife had bit into the flesh, had tasted blood.  
  
(But it felt good. It made me realize that I was still alive, if only for that instant.) Without realizing it he picked the knife up and extended the blade. Then, before he could stop himself, he let the knife flash across the skin of his arm. It left a searing kiss in its wake, and from that kiss welled up blood.  
  
(That felt good. I hadn't realized how much I missed the physical pain after all. But I guess physical pain is easier to deal with than emotional pain.)  
  
Time and time again he let the knife sear his skin, and time and time again a deep crimson blood welled from his wounds until it ran from his arm onto the white tiles of the bathroom floor. He stared transfixedly at it, mesmerized. He hadn't seen anything so captivating in a long time.  
  
(It's like blood on snow. So much color on such a blank surface. It's almost pretty. Should I paint the room with my blood?)  
  
Duo gave a strangled cry and dropped the knife. It clattered on the floor loudly in the echoing silence as Duo ran from the room. He went to the kitchen and wrapped a towel around his bleeding arm before he picked up his vid phone and punched in Wufei's number. Three rings later the Chinese pilot answered.  
  
"Hmm? Maxwell? What do you want? Its three fucking AM in the morning."  
  
"Wufei, I need to talk to you," Duo said as calmly as he could. He was amazed when his voice didn't shake.  
  
"Maxwell, talk to that stupid onna living with you. Leave me in peace," Wufei growled as he disconnected the call. The dial tone sounded loudly and Duo was left staring at the blank screen.  
  
(He didn't care.)  
  
He tried to get a hold of Trowa then, but when Cathy picked up the phone she told him that he was at Quatre's. Duo thanked her kindly and let her go back to sleep as he dialed his friend's house. Quatre picked up almost immediately and looked at him, puzzlement clearly showing on his features. "Hey Duo," he said uncertainly.  
  
"Quatre, I need to talk to you," Duo said again, hoping that his friend would listen.  
  
"Quatre, come back to bed," a familiar voice whispered in the background. Duo saw Quatre glance over his shoulder and then back at the screen.  
  
"Duo, call me back in the morning. I'll talk with you then," Quatre said, putting a smile on his face before he hung up without even waiting to hear what his friend would say. Duo closed his eyes and numbly put the phone down.  
  
(I was right. They don't care about me. They don't care that I call them up in the middle of the night and ask for their help. They don't care that I'm suffering. They just want to keep their own lives happy. They don't want to see into mine. But they don't know what its like.)  
  
He wandered over to the table and sat down, burying his face in his hands. A terrible ache welled up in his chest and his throat tightened, making it hard for him to breath. He struggled with himself, trying to get release from his anxiety, but in the end he gave up.  
  
(I've forgotten how to cry.)  
  
/Stuck forced to survive  
  
And I trip and fall  
  
And am forced to dine  
  
On moments on moments/  
  
Eventually Duo picked up the phone again and dialed the last number he wanted to. Five rings later an answering machine picked up and he hesitated before starting to speak. "Heero," he said, his voice quavering. "Could you pick up? It's Duo. I need to talk to you. It's really important."  
  
A face appeared on the screen and he felt himself catch his breath. Even when he was woken in the middle of the night Heero was a dream. His hair was mussed, and he was rubbing his eyes to try and clear them, but it just made him seem all the more adorable.  
  
"What do you need Duo? I'm right here," Heero said calmly as he could, but Duo knew what he saw. He saw a walking, hollow corpse.  
  
"Heero, I need your help, really badly," he said in a rush. He didn't want his friend to hang up on him like the others.  
  
"Duo, are you okay? Do you want me to come over?" Heero asked, concern evident in his features.  
  
"No, I'm not okay!" Duo half-shouted, half-sobbed as he unwrapped the towel from around his still bleeding arm and showed it to Heero. "Please, help me. I'm afraid."  
  
Heero's eyes grew wide before he slid the mask down over his features. His eyes became cold and remote and nothing he did gave away any indication of what he was thinking or feeling. He got up from his chair and disappeared. A moment later the light went out in his bedroom and then a hand snaked out and shut the phone down.  
  
"NO!" Duo wailed as he collapsed on the floor, sobbing. His mind started swimming in little circles.  
  
(He hung up. He went back to bed. None of them care. None of them care if I'm in trouble. None of them care if I live or die. Heero doesn't care. He walked away when I told him how I felt and he rejected me when I asked for his help! How much pain does one person have to take?)  
  
/Descending like family  
  
Of resent and clouded hate  
  
I sit and sit  
  
And something happens  
  
And I scream/  
  
Duo picked himself up from the floor and ran back to the bathroom.  
  
(I can't take it anymore! I can't! If none of them will even try to help me, then so be it. I can't be helped.)  
  
He picked the knife up from the floor and contemplated it. Then he sat down with his back to the door. He just sat staring at it, turning it over in his hands. He just couldn't bring himself to do anything with it. It had already tasted his blood more than once that night. Why would it want to do so again. Was it even still hungry?  
  
He smiled to himself as he drew a lone of blood across his unmarred arm. (It is always hungry. Just like war, it will never be satisfied. Just like war, it hungers. And just like war, it will feed. No one can stop it.)  
  
Slowly, oh so slowly he drew his knife across his wrists. He wanted to prolong any pain he might experience, but he felt nothing. It was as if he was not even real as the blood began to pool in his hands before trickling onto the floor. Again he was struck by the beauty of the color, but it quickly fled from his mind as his world grew dimmer, then went black.  
  
/I slit my wrists but do they bleed  
  
They stay in the only Something  
  
Bordering Nothing  
  
And Nothing creeps at my skin  
  
Or makes me wake in the night  
  
Or hastens my pace  
  
Jump/  
  
"Duo? Duo?!" Heero called out as he came in the front door. Duo hadn't locked it when he'd come inside.  
  
Heero called again and again for Duo as he searched the house. He finally found him laying in his bathroom, propped up by the door. He hurried to his side, only to stop short at the sight of all the blood.  
  
"My God! Duo! Duo, speak to me! Wake up!" Heero yelled franticly as he shook his friend. Duo roused himself out of his peaceful slumber to see exactly who was disturbing it. His breath caught in his throat as he found himself staring into Heero's familiar Prussian blue eyes.  
  
"You came," he whispered. "You really did care." He reached up with one trembling hand to caress the side of his lovers face before it fell back to his side and his spirit fled its earthy cage.  
  
"Duo? Duo?! No!!" Heero screamed as he began to cry. He rocked his dead love in his arms and cursed himself. "Why? Why didn't you wait for me? I thought you understood my silence. I was coming for you. Why didn't you fight a little longer?"  
  
/Stand and fight  
  
So ironic I am the End of Nothing  
  
But cannot raise Something/  
  
"I thought you understood my silence," Heero sobbed into his air as he carried him to his bed and laid him out. Carefully he bathed his wounds to clean them and then put him into a peaceful position. "I thought you understood how much I loved you."  
  
He leaned down for a moment and brushed a kiss across Duo's quickly cooling lips. Then he lay down on the bed, his head pillowed on Duo's shoulder, as he reached for the knife.  
  
/So I sit  
  
And pray for Nothing  
  
Let it take me in my sleep  
  
Let Nothing devour me  
  
And my mocking reality/  
  
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Dream Keeper: Okay, its almost 1 in the morning. Hope you liked it. I know it was really depressing, but I was in a depressing mood.  
  
Christa: Don't forget to R&R which means read AND REVIEW. Thank you. Like we said before, the poem belongs to a guy named Vokin. If he approves, expect us to be working with more of his poetry. It's inspiring.  
  
Dream Keeper: Just to give you something to think about. Look at these lines.  
  
It is always hungry. Just like war, it will never be satisfied. Just like war, it hungers. And just like war, it will feed. No one can stop it.  
  
Now, do you think it was talking about the knife?. or madness? Until next time!  
  
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End file.
